Toy blocks (also building bricks, building blocks, or simply blocks), are wooden, plastic or foam pieces of various shapes and colors that are used as construction toys. Contemporary building blocks are limited in available shapes. Typical building blocks shapes include squares, rectangles, cylinders, and the like. Toy blocks build strength in a child's fingers and hands, and improve eye-hand coordination. They also help educate children in different shapes. Children can potentially develop their vocabularies as they learn to describe sizes, shapes, and positions. Math skills are developed through the process of grouping, adding, and subtracting, particularly with standardized blocks, such as unit blocks. Experiences with gravity, balance, and geometry learned from toy blocks also provide intellectual stimulation.
Building blocks have been historically and are currently available in diverse range of materials and are used to compose two and three-dimensional structures ranging from floor tiles and bricks of all shapes and sizes to spherical jigsaw puzzles and even geodesics. The means to temporarily attach one building block to another limits the combinatorial possibilities of building blocks. Common coupling means to temporarily combine building blocks include the use of pressure and compression fit such as a simple pin in slot solution (i.e., Lego or wooden dowel constructions sets). The use of a pin and slot coupling system limits the universe of possible shapes as at least one of the shapes must include a pin and at least one of the shapes must include a slot.
Other building blocks use screw fits such as with nuts and bolts (i.e., conventional erector sets). Sticky tape and hook and loop fastening systems (i.e., Velcro) have been used to combine two or more building blocks. The use of nuts and bolts and/or sticky tape or hook and loop fasteners introduces additional elements and unnecessarily increases the costs associated with such building block systems.
Often building blocks are combined utilizing pressure induced by gravity in a way that is an extension of the traditional Roman arch combined with three-dimensionally layered male-female tab and slot structure called keys and keyways. Combining building blocks in this manner has advantages over simple pressure fit combinatorial building blocks as no physical pressure is required just simple fit and a reliance on arch like formations to create a gravitational pressure fit. However, this type of building block coupling also has disadvantages. One disadvantage with building blocks that use the traditional Roman arch and key and keyway coupling means is that typically multiple blocks must be used to create the arch. That is, typically two blocks cannot be combined with one another.